These Are the 3 First Marketing Hires You Should Make

Marketing School - Digital Marketing and Online Marketing Tips

Eric Siu and Neil Patel

Careers, Business, Marketing

4.6 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 27 November 2025

⏱️ 17 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Growth Newsletter: https://levelingup.beehiiv.com/subscribe Need marketing help? Visit: https://www.singlegrain.com/ and https://npdigital.com/ Want to recruit great marketers? Find them here: https://marketingschool.io/hire Neil and Eric break down the three must-have marketing hires for 2026, why influencer marketing is shifting to micro creators, how data and analytics unlock real ROI, and why digital PR and citations matter in the AI search era. They also explore the rise of the vibe growth marketing manager, the changing expectations for modern marketers, the evolving CMO role, and the underrated power of email as a revenue engine. KEY TAKEAWAYS -Micro influencers drive massive ROI -Data clarity beats bigger budgets -Email remains the strongest profit lever CHAPTERS (0:00) Building a 2026 marketing team (01:02) Influencer hire essentials (02:24) Micro influencer ROI (04:20) Data and analytics hire (05:59) Digital PR importance (07:15) Vibe growth marketing manager (08:40) Skills modern marketers need (09:50) CMO role evolution (11:56) Email as revenue engine (14:34) Enterprise marketing strategy (15:59) Final marketing lessons 𝗔𝗕𝗢𝗨𝗧 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗖𝗛𝗔𝗡𝗡𝗘𝗟 Welcome to Marketing School, one of the top business podcasts with over 61 million downloads. Each episode delivers actionable marketing tips and strategies from two entrepreneurs who truly practice what they preach. The show is hosted by Eric Siu, founder of Leveling Up and Single Grain, and Neil Patel, co-founder of Neil Patel Digital and recognized by Forbes as a Top 10 Marketer. 🎙️ Learn More About the Hosts Eric Siu – Leveling Up: https://www.youtube.com/@LevelingUpOfficial Neil Patel: https://www.youtube.com/@neilpatel 📩 Free Resources Growth Newsletter: https://levelingup.beehiiv.com/subscribe Ubersuggest: https://www.ubersuggest.com/ Answer The Public: https://www.answerthepublic.com/ ✅ Subscribe for Daily Marketing Insights!

Transcript

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0:00.0	So if you were to build a marketing team in 2026, I actually had this question asked to me this morning.
0:06.4	Oh.
0:07.3	How would you set up your marketing team?
0:09.8	What kind of business?
0:12.0	It can be software.
0:13.3	It could be services.
0:14.0	It could be e-commerce.
0:16.2	And people already know the basics.
0:18.5	But if you had to pick three key hires, this was actually the
0:22.6	specific question that was related to the marketing team, because that's something similar.
0:26.9	I was like, well, how is the marketing team already set up as a new business not?
0:30.6	So then it got narrowed down during the podcast interview to what would be your three main
0:35.8	hires in marketing for 2026?
0:39.3	So this was actually spawned from a Twitter thread that we actually went over a couple weeks ago.
0:46.3	So because I remember this thread.
0:49.1	It was from one of the marketing operators podcast guys.
0:51.9	And I think for me, if we're talking D to C, I think you have to have an influencer marketing
0:57.4	person.
0:58.4	I think you have to have an influencer marketing person.
1:01.0	What's your first one?
1:02.1	So let's combine them.
1:04.0	I also believe in influencer marketer, but I think you need an influencer marketer, whether
	...

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